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Woodfinden: Liberals’ pharmacare aims to steal NDP votes

Ben Woodfinden, Special to Postmedia Network

Thursday, March 1, 2018
5:02:30 EST PM

Minister of Health Ginette Petitpas Taylor stands with Eric Hoskins, former Ontario Minister of Health, after the tabling of the budget in the House of Commons on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on Tuesday, Feb. 27, 2018. Hoskins will chair a federal government advisory council to implement a national pharmacare plan. THE CANADIAN PRESS

There are still more than 18 months until the 2019 federal election, but the 2018 budget may have revealed what the Liberals intend to make the campaign about.

Tuesday’s federal budget confirmed Ontario newly departed health minister Eric Hoskins will chair an advisory council that will conduct an economic assessment of the viability of a national pharmacare program.

The government has already studied the idea extensively. The House of Commons standing committee on health is close to completing a report on pharmacare, and in 2016 the Parliamentary Budget Office completed an analysis that estimated a program would cost around $19.3 billion.

Hoskins is expected to deliver a report next spring with options for the implementation of a national plan. This will pave the way for pharmacare to be central to the Liberal platform in the fall of 2019.

When pushed on when pharmacare would be implemented, Morneau refused to get into specifics, which tells you all you need to know about Liberal intentions.

Justin Trudeau’s campaign team know that if they are to repeat their 2015 results, they will need to convince progressive voters who abandoned the NDP last time to do so again. Pharmacare could ensure the Liberals another majority.

Former senator Keith Davey famously quipped the Liberals “campaign from the left, govern from the right.” In other words, the Liberals have a history of broken promises to progressives. The broken 2015 promise to get rid of first-past-the-post electoral system is a classic example. In 1997, the Liberals also promised a never-implemented universal prescription drug plan.

The federal NDP affirmed its support for pharmacare at its most recent convention and the Ontario NDP are also set to make a provincial plan the central plank in their election platform for the June 7 provincial vote.

Federal NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh tried to brush off this week’s budget proposal, telling reporters “what the government is proposing is not a plan. This is a fantasy.” However, Singh must be concerned. By stealing this vote-getting promise, Trudeau’s government has a good chance of starving the NDP of oxygen and limiting the possibility of any major breakthrough for its new leader.

It will be just as hard for Conservatives to offer any serious opposition to the plan. Any resistance offered will give the Liberals a treasure trove of material with which to attack the Tories.

Pharmacare appeals across demographics. Millennials, who will be the biggest voting cohort in 2019, are likely to be attracted to the proposal. Younger millennials, who are just entering the workforce, often lose access to both parental and university health plans. The Kathleen Wynne government in Ontario has tried to capitalize on this by offering prescription drug coverage for people under the age of 25.

Pharmacare is also likely to appeal to older voters, who face increasing health care costs as they age. This is a demographic that is guaranteed to show up on election day.

Canadians identify health care as one of the things that make them proudest of their country. Campaigning on an expansion of universal health care is the political equivalent of wrapping yourself in the flag. By studying this now, the Liberals can present themselves as the party most prepared to implement it once re-elected.

Love them or loathe them, the Liberals are at their cynical best here. Steal the best ideas from their opponents, make Canadian and Liberal values indistinguishable, and reap the electoral reward.

The next election may be some time away, but the campaign has begun.

Ottawa based writer Ben Woodfinden holds an MA in political science from Carleton University.